No Dismember? That card has been so ubiquitous in nonblack decks it seems surprising to not have it in a deck that could occasionally pay its mana cost.

I mean, the reason Dismember is ubiquitous in nonblack decks is because those decks don't have that many other removal options. If there was a white Doom Blade, Dismember would see a lot less play.Dismember

It is an efficient removal spell, though, and in fact a copy or two was in our deck for awhile. The problem is twofold: a) you can't really afford the life and b) it doesn't kill Titans or Consecrated Sphinx. Doom Blade is the all-around better card for the deck. There are hardly any black creatures getting play these days, so Doom Blade is pretty close to a mono-black Terminate, and the advantage of being able to cast Dismember for one is outweighed by the corresponding disadvantages. If you're casting a removal spell for one mana, you'd rather it be Wring Flesh, which still kills Birds, Inkmoth, Viridian Emissary, Snapcaster Mage, every red one-drop, and most of Tempered Steel's creatures. Getting blasted for 4 in the face is pretty bad for a deck as controlling as this one.How many games did you win with Nephalia Drownyard, and when would you bring in two copies from your sideboard?

Drownyard occupies an interesting slot in this deck. It's only rarely useful, but in the matchups where it's good, it single-handedly wins you the game. I won only three games with it over the course of the tournament, but that was because I played only two control mirrors. My feature match in Round 11 was one, and it pretty much sums it up. He was the Blue-Black mirror, but he had Inkmoth Nexus where I had Drownyard, so both games we sat around and durdled for a while and then I milled him. The other match was against Solar Flare. Usually the mill strategy works there as well, and I did mill him out in Game 1, but for Game 2 he had Surgical Extraction + Ghost Quarter to take out my land-based kill condition. Game 3, knowing he'd taken Doom Blades out, I sided my Sphinxes back in and beat him up while he missed land drops.Nephalia Drownyard

You want to side up to 29 lands against control because you never ever want to miss land drops, and it's not like getting flooded is an issue. What are they going to do? Beat you up? The person with more lands is the person who can cast more spells, or pay for more Mana Leaks, or activate more Drownyards, and they almost always have the upper hand. The lands you side in could reasonably be Ghost Quarter + Drownyard, but I preferred 2 Drownyard. You want to have two in play against Solar Flare because milling them with just one can be a little risky, putting gas into their bin, especially if they then deal with it (some Flare lists are playing their own Ghost Quarter these days). Once you have two in play you can usually just race whatever they're doing, though. It's a surprisingly fast clock.

Take-home message: Drownyard beats control. If you don't want to lose to the mirror with Drownyard, play Drownyard.What were the various plans your sideboard had? It seems like all the cards were very cheap to cast. Was that deliberate?

Not as such, but it's interesting you should mention that. As I said earlier, because of the way the deck is constructed, you basically never want to tap out on your turn unless it's for a six-drop that's just going to kill them. Four- and five-mana sorcery speed spells like Curse of Death's Hold, Skinrender, and Solemn Simulacrum didn't make it for exactly that reason. Part of the reason Phantasmal Image is such a great answer to Thrun is that you can play it and still have Mana Leak up for their follow-up Garruk. So while we never consciously thought "our sideboard has to be full of cheap spells," that's what sort of naturally arose because of the need to have untapped mana on turns three through six. If something like Treachery existed, or a four-mana instant that dealt with Thrun and planeswalkers, you can bet we would've played it, cheap or no.Phantasmal Image

Wring Flesh was not a card on a lot of people's radar coming into the event. How did you end up playing it, and what role did it play for you?

Wring Flesh is AWESOME! Removal spells that deal with 1-toughness creatures are better placed now than they have ever been in the past (see also: Geistflame and Gut Shot actually getting played in Mono-Red). If Hornet Sting was still legal, I would not be surprised to see a few in green decks' boards. Every deck has targets for Wring Flesh: Snapcaster Mage in the control mirrors, mana dorks or tokens against the Token decks, every cheap creature Mono-Red or Tempered Steel runs, Inkmoth and Birds against the ramp decks. It basically does the same thing Disfigure did in Blue-Black Control at Worlds 2010 in Chiba—trades with the cheap creatures aggro plays for the low, low price of one mana—and taking out a Stromkirk Noble still takes the wind out of a red deck's sails the same way taking out a Goblin Guide used to.Wring Flesh

The blue-black deck gave Jeremy all the tools he needed to win the Grand Prix.